The Ghost of Grey Fox Inn (9 page)

“He seemed a little too happy about all of Parker and Charlotte's misfortunes over the past couple of days,” George murmured with a nod. “And not only that, it sounds like he has a theory about who's behind it! And who better to know than if he did it all himself?”

“I don't know, though,” Bess whispered. “There's something about the pranks that just doesn't seem like Tucker's style. Changing the flower color? A knife in a fancy, gift-wrapped box? It all feels so . . . subtle. And Tucker doesn't strike me as the subtle type.”

I had to agree. “You're right, it doesn't quite fit—but he's our best guess right now, and you can't ignore what we just overheard. Maybe he did those types of pranks just to throw people off his scent. Let's check
out the rest of this passage before we head back to my room.”

What we found at the end of the hallway was a hole in the floor with a ladder leading down to the first floor. The three of us descended the ladder as quietly as we could and found another peephole leading to Parker's room. “There you have it,” I said, wiping a cluster of cobwebs from my hair. “Anyone with access to this passage could have gotten into Parker's room and stolen the wedding rings.”

“So that narrows it down to the people in the rooms who have entrances,” Bess mused. “But that still includes everyone who we already suspected—so not a lot of help.”

“Better than nothing,” George said. “At least we know we're on the right track.”

The passage on the first floor was much smaller than the one on the second, so there wasn't a lot to see. At the end of the hall, I inspected the panel where another entrance would normally have been—they usually appeared at regular intervals. But this panel
didn't have a peephole. I knocked on it lightly and found it hollow. “Where do you think this one leads to?” I wondered aloud. I took a couple of steps forward to inspect the edge of the panel and tripped over something at my feet.

“You okay, Nancy?” Bess asked.

“Yeah,” I murmured, regaining my footing, and shone the smartphone light down at the floor. What I saw was a crumpled-up grocery bag, and its contents had spilled out onto the floor when I stumbled over it. I caught a glimpse of blue fabric and quickly snatched it up. “Look!” I exclaimed.

“What is it?” George said.

“This is the uniform the so-called ghost was wearing when he snuck into my room!” I pulled the whole bundle out of the bag and saw that it was some kind of old military costume. “It looks Civil War–era,” I mused.

“Sounds like someone's trying to impersonate a ghost,” George said. “But why?”

“I don't know,” I said. I turned the bag upside down
to make sure nothing else was inside, and a single scrap of paper fluttered out. I picked it up and scanned the writing. “But this might help us figure it out.”

It was a tattered newspaper clipping, yellowed with age. There were pictures of cars that looked at least seventy-five years old, as well as an ad calling for women to try out a new girdle that would make their waists look thinner. But most of the page was taken up by an article with the headline
SPOOKY HAUNTINGS AT THE GREY FOX INN!
It read:

Out-of-towners are once again hollering about the haunted happenings at the local Grey Fox Inn. Guests at the inn speak of a “uniformed gentleman” who makes visits to their rooms, opening doors, moving objects, and appearing to startled citizens in the wee hours of the night. Contrary to expectations, patronage of the inn has reached an all-time high, according to the owner, with the entire establishment fully
booked through the end of the year. It seems like everyone in Charleston is looking to get a peek at the Ghost of Grey Fox Inn!

I handed the article over to Bess and George and tapped my chin in thought. From the sound of it, back then the inn had been haunted by the same kind of “ghost” as we were dealing with right now! But what did this have to do with Charlotte's wedding? Was the culprit hoping to use this tidbit of history to make their pranks seem like genuine ghost sightings? Were they hoping that Mrs. Hill's superstitious nature would be upset by all the bad juju and she would call off the wedding? If so, the plan had almost worked. It was only after it had been made clear that the ceremony was still on that the wedding rings had been stolen. Obviously the culprit needed to go to greater lengths in order to shut the whole thing down—so that's what they did.

Tucker Matthews, being in the news business, would have had access to a lot of this information. But then again, so would Alicia. In fact, considering that she'd worked at the historical society, Alicia would
have had even greater access to the history of the inn; certainly newspaper clippings like this one. I couldn't zero in on Tucker as my main suspect without ruling out Alicia, and that meant taking a trip over to the historical society itself. I had a feeling that someone there might be able to shed more light on Alicia's feelings toward Charlotte and Parker—if she was the one behind all this, we needed to figure that out fast.

The three of us climbed up the ladder and picked our way through the dark, back to my room. After shutting the hidden panel behind us, we all collapsed onto chairs, dusty and exhausted.

“Ugh, look at the carpet,” Bess said. “It looks like we tracked in more of that ash—just like the ghost did when he came in here.”

“I'll try and clean it up a little tomorrow before the maid comes in,” I said with a yawn. “In the meantime, here's our plan.” I quickly laid out my thoughts about Alicia, and we agreed to make a trip to the historical society first thing in the morning, before any of the wedding activities began. “We need to start crossing
off names,” I finished, “and I think this is the best chance we've got at figuring out who did all this and getting the rings back in time.”

Bess and George nodded. As we all said our good nights, I tried to sound more confident than I felt. Tomorrow was the big day. Charlotte and Parker surely had their vows all planned out, and I hadn't forgotten mine. For better or for worse—it was my job to save this wedding!

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

I felt like my head had only just hit the pillow when my alarm clock went off. Blearily, I groped around until my hand hit the snooze button, and the room was silent once again. I collapsed back into the covers and yawned.

No time for snoozing, Nancy Drew,
a voice in my head warned.
It's Saturday, the day of the wedding, and you have a bad guy to catch!

Rubbing the sleep from my eyes, I hopped out of bed, stretched, and quickly dressed in the early morning
light. Five minutes later I slipped out of my room into the stillness of the inn. It was early enough that all the guests were still asleep in their beds—a perfect time for the girls and I to sneak out and do some last-minute investigating. Parker could only keep the missing rings secret for so long—we needed an answer before the wedding had to be canceled!

Bess and George were already waiting for me in the lobby, looking about as tired and bleary-eyed as I felt. “Ready to go?” I asked.

“Absolutely,” Bess said. “I want to catch this person, once and for all!”

Fifteen minutes later I pulled the convertible up to the Charleston Historical Society. It was a majestic white building, boasting wide columns and elegant domed windows. “It almost looks like the White House!” George observed.

“Let's hope we find what we're looking for,” I said.

Inside, we found a high-ceilinged lobby, crowned with a wrought-iron chandelier above us. A welcome desk in the center of the room stood unmanned, the
computer still switched off for the night. As a matter of fact, the whole building was as quiet as the sleeping inn, and I immediately began to worry that we had come too early—what if there was no one here to help us?

“Um, hello?” I called out. “Is anyone here?”

No answer.

I looked back at Bess and George. George shrugged and said, “Well, we're here, and the door was unlocked. It couldn't hurt for us to take a look around, could it?”

I glanced at Bess. “What do you think?”

Bess's mouth twisted with discomfort, but after a moment, I saw her expression set with steely resolve. “I think we don't have time to waste. If the answer's here, let's go and find it.”

There were three corridors leading away from the main lobby. We decided to split up—Bess taking the left-hand passage, George taking the right, and me going down the stairs behind the welcome desk to the corridor straight ahead. “Look for anything you can find about Alicia Coleman,” I said. “An old staff
file, something on the computer system—anything.” I turned to go, but on a whim, added, “And while you're at it, see if you can find anything else about the Grey Fox Inn.” Something about that old newspaper article we'd found in the secret passage left me wondering if there was more to it than I had first imagined. We agreed to meet back in the lobby in ten minutes to share our findings.

I made my way to the staircase, trying as best I could to silence my steps on the gray stone tiles. At the bottom of the short stairwell, I found two public bathrooms, one door marked
STAFF ONLY
, and another one labeled
RECORDS ARCHIVE
. Unfortunately, the staff room was locked up tight—but the records room wasn't. I turned the doorknob to find a room filled with row after row of tall metal shelves, each one piled with brown filing boxes. It was dimly lit from three high-up windows at the back wall, the morning light illuminating thousands of dust motes that were thrown into the air when I opened the door. If there was any place to find what I was looking for, it had to be here!

Not risking turning on the lights, I flicked on my phone's flashlight, slipped into the room, and squinted up at the boxes on the shelves, searching the labels for anything about old staff members. Everything was arranged into categories and then ordered alphabetically—the row I was in seemed to be dedicated to famous citizens of Charleston. The next row was all about historic places in the city, and as I passed the box labeled Ga-Gr, I paused and decided to follow up on my earlier hunch.

Pulling the box from the shelf, I flipped through it until I found what I was looking for: a whole folder about the Grey Fox Inn. I opened it up and quickly flipped through the various newspaper clippings, letters, and other miscellaneous papers, not really sure what I was looking for.

Suddenly the room was flooded with fluorescent light, dazzling me and surprising me so much that the contents of the folder spilled onto the floor.

“Hey! Is somebody in here?” a man's voice called out. Hidden as I was between two rows of shelving, I
couldn't see who it was. My heart leaped into my throat.

“I heard you! Whoever you are, come out before I call the police!” the man said. I could hear his footsteps advancing into the room. But he was behind one of the other shelves and couldn't see me, either.

Maybe if I just creep out while he's searching for me,
I thought desperately,
I can come back in a little while and act like I just got here
.

I tiptoed toward the door and was almost home free when I felt a large hand clamp down on my shoulder. Despite myself, I let out a yelp.

“Nancy Drew?” a voice asked.

Puzzled, I whirled around and found myself face-to-face with Reggie Banks—Parker's best man! “Reggie!” I exclaimed, filled with relief. “Oh, I'm so glad it's you.”

Reggie smiled uncertainly. “Yes, well—I have to ship off a rare document to the state museum in Columbia before Monday. May I ask what you're doing here . . . in the records room . . . alone?”

I felt my cheeks grow hot. “Well, it's actually a long story. But I could really use your help.”

An instant later Bess and George tore into the room, out of breath. “Nancy, are you all right—oh!” Bess stopped short the moment she saw Reggie standing there next to me. “Why, hello,” she said to him.

“Hi,” Reggie replied. He looked between the three of us, utterly confused. “I really am missing something, aren't I?”

For the next few minutes, the girls and I filled Reggie in on everything that had happened since we'd arrived. He was staggered to hear that as of last night, the wedding rings were missing. “I can't believe Parker didn't tell me,” he murmured, looking hurt. “I'm not only his best man, I'm his best friend!”

“Don't take it personally, Reggie,” Bess said. “This only happened late last night, and we told him to keep it to himself—he didn't want any of the guests to find out.”

Reggie nodded, and then turned to me. “You said you're some kind of amateur detective. So, who do you think is behind all of this?”

“I've got a couple of hunches,” I replied. “But we need
more evidence to figure out which one is right. That's actually why we're here. We couldn't find anyone around when we arrived, so we decided to just poke around a bit on our own to look for information.” I bit my lip. “Sorry about that.”